life with cole & murphy.: //The Key To My H...andcuffs+

When Cole and I started dating, he was in the Police Academy. One of the rules of being in the Police Academy, is that if you get a ticket while attending, you don’t graduate.

Because of that rule, Cole refused to speed. Seriously. If you looked up the word “cautious” in the dictionary, my slow-ass-grandma-speed husband’s picture would’ve been there.

Even now, most of our drives consist of me begging him to drive faster, and a wall of cars behind us that are too scared to pass him, even though he’s only going 60mph in the fast lane.

Ironically, he married a girl whose ADHD has many times transferred over to her driving – resulting in quite a few tickets, and even a couple warrants.

I was attending Southern Utah University – about 4 hours away from Cole’s house. Saying I drove a lot, would be a vast understatement.

One weekend, after my 100^th time driving the same (surprisingly scene-less) route, I finally made it home.

Cole arrived at my house in his Mom’s car. When I came outside, he insisted we drive my car.
Um, hi, I want to ride in the fancy shmancy Mercedes.

So, I asked him why we were taking my car, that I had just driven in for 4 hours, and was SICK TO DEATH of.

He replied: “My mom’s car is out of gas.”
Ok. Wait, how did you get here then?

“I barely made it here.”
You’re being weird. Whether we get gas now, or get gas later – either way, you’re going to have to get gas. Why don’t we just get gas now?

He got impatient, grabbed the keys out of my purse, and rushed me into my KIA Soul which I had just gotten out of.

I was so confused. And concerned about my Mother-In-Law’s fancy car. And the fact that my idiot boyfriend wasn’t going to make it home in the car.

So I kept asking him questions about his “game-plan”. And he kept rambling off words that didn’t even resemble an actual answer.

So the questions stopped. But, NEVER FEAR, the weirdness continued.

He was talking so much. I physically could not even blink in between his sentences, let alone get a word in.

The chatty king told me we had to go deliver a birthday card from his Mom to his Step-Brother.

K, what the heck? I’ve never even met your Step-Brother. This is why I drove 4 hours from Cedar City? To run weird birthday errands for your mom?

But, I tried to be civil about it. So I asked him how old Jason was turning. You know, to be interested.

He had absolutely no idea.
Well, this should be fun then.

“Can I see the card?”
He didn’t even have a card with him.
So we drove back to his Mom’s house to get one.
Why didn’t we just bring your Mom’s car and leave it here?

Whatever, this is dumb.

He comes back outside with an un-opened, still-in-the-plastic card.
(Everyone applaud the worst cover-story of all time).

Ok, so not only is this the weirdest Friday night ever. Not only do I have to meet a Step-Brother that my husband knows nothing about. Not only is the Chatty King reigning. But it started to become the scariest drive of my life.

I honestly thought he was having a stroke. Passing cars on the freeway, swerving through microscopic gaps in traffic, slamming on the brakes.
WHAT IS GOING ON, WHY IS GRANDMA DRIVING LIKE THIS?

(Are we speeding to give Jason a birthday card or…? Seriously. Just the worst cover-story of all time).

When we somehow made if off the freeway alive, he got even more chaotic. He was driving 50mph in a 30mph zone. He was TRYING TO PASS CARS IN THE CITY.

Hi, let me just remind you again: Cole Peterson does not speed. Cole Peterson does not break laws. In fact, Cole Peterson barely even drives the speed limit.

Cole Peterson goes 65 in the fast lane, while cars are flipping him off, because (AND I QUOTE) “No one should be driving faster than this.”

So here I am, afraid for my life, afraid of my boyfriend’s sudden personality disorder, afraid of him getting kicked out of the Police Academy.

I just keep yelling: “WHAT IS GOING ON? WHO ARE YOU?”

(Cue my worst nightmare) We get pulled over. Grandma-Ass Cole Peterson gets pulled over at the END OF HIS POLICE ACADEMY.

WELL, THIS IS JUST GREAT COLE.
What are we supposed to do with our future now?? You better damn well have a backup plan.
And you know what? You deserve to be pulled over after driving like that, I hope you do get a ticket.
Seriously, on the way home we’re stopping at a hospital because YOU ARE NOT COLE.

(Lecture continued for a while)

I was really not a happy camper. I mean, his life was over. Because Police is his life. (Well, and me, but I was about to end his life, myself). He had wanted this since he was 3-year-old, calling 911 on the house phone, just to see the cops come.

So, the cop walks up to us, and gets Cole’s license, proof of insurance, etc. He also asks for my name. I didn’t think twice about it, until a second cop showed up, and they both asked me to step out of my car.

Wait, what? Make my idiot boyfriend get out of the car, he’s the one having a stroke!

I was extremely angry at this point. Cole is going to get kicked out of the academy, and I’m getting pulled out of my car by cops.
JUST PHENOMENAL.

The Officers then told me to put both of my hands on the car, and continued to explain to me how there was a warrant out for my arrest for an unpaid ticket.
Now, this is where Cole’s plan wasn’t flawed, because the queen of tickets didn’t think twice about it. All I could think was:

“My dad is going to kill me.”
That was really my only concern.
They then proceeded to handcuff me. (Again, not the first time that had happened).

But, this is the part of the night where my fuse blew – because they pulled Cole out of the car. They pulled my law-obeying, honest, moral, responsible boyfriend out of the car. And even though I was mad at him for driving like an idiot, he was still the one human being on Earth I knew didn’t deserve this.

So, saying I was mad would be an understatement.

I started to become increasingly rude to the cops. I didn’t understand why they were pulling Cole out of the car for speeding. And I definitely wasn’t getting any answers. Just silence. And the longer the silence, the angrier I was getting.

They made him put his hands on the car, and started to search him.
WHAT IN DEVIL’S NAME IS GOING ON? IS THIS EVEN LEGAL?

They pulled out his phone, pulled out a pen, and then pulled out a tiny black box.

I have never been so stunned. Not even stunned as in surprised, stunned as in it was extremely hard to physically make words come out of my mouth.
And I’ve never seen a human being shake so hard. I’m surprised the box didn’t jump right out of his hands, they were freaking trampolines at this point.

You always watch cutesy videos of girls gracefully and beautifully covering their mouths and crying “YES!” to their (almost) fiancé.
They look perfect in all the pictures, and it’s a perfectly perfect picture-perfect moment, right?

Ok, so picture those girls.
Now picture the opposite.

I stuttered as he got down on a knee, and could only manage to squeak out two syllables, resulting in “ya!”, as he asked me the most important question of my life.

But the way he was smiling as he listened to me, completely makes up for his spastic fiance’s response.
The way the look in his eyes changed as I went from his girlfriend to his fiancé, absolutely replaces the stuttering and shaking and the lack of grace.

They couldn’t get the handcuffs off me fast enough (who actually turned out to be Cole’s Step-Brother whom I had never met).

The rest of the night was a blur filled with me dropping things and stuttering every 9 words.
I mean, the first person I called to tell was my friend named Spencer Gray…
…Not my mom, not my best friend, not my brothers…Spencer Gray.
Hahah nothing has ever felt more dream-like in my whole life.

Cole just kept laughing that sweet laugh of his, and I continued to trip and stutter and smash my fingers in doors.

I mean, on the way home I even managed to RUN OVER the little black box.
(I’m so romantic).